


Quiet & Miserable People

by rei_c



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dead Scott McCall (Teen Wolf), Gen, Human Alpha Stiles Stilinski, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Post-Nogitsune, Stiles Stilinski Leaves Beacon Hills
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:40:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25766854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rei_c/pseuds/rei_c
Summary: The nogitsune possessed Scott, not Stiles, and before it could enact its plans using the body and pack of an alpha wolf, Stiles did what no one else was capable of doing.He's been on the run for three years when Peter catches up to him in middle-of-nowhere Florida.
Relationships: Peter Hale & Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 38
Kudos: 501





	Quiet & Miserable People

Peter finds him in a run-down motel halfway between Tallahassee and Mobile. The door to the room is open, Stiles perched on the bed closest to the door, facing the street. He hasn't bothered to turn the lights on and Peter traces out the curves of Stiles' cheekbones and the hollows under his eyes in dim streetlight and the reflection of neon in puddles. 

"You didn't make yourself easy to find," Peter says. 

"Didn't mean to," Stiles replies. "Best-laid plans, and all that shit." 

The zing of neon flickering off and on echoes in Peter's ears along with the rhythm -- too slow -- of Stiles' heartbeat. "Can I come in?" Peter asks. 

Stiles gives him a wry smile and asks, "Do I look like I could stop you even if I wanted to?" 

"Come, now, Stiles," Peter says. "When have I ever overstepped your boundaries?" 

Stiles looks at him for a long, thoughtful moment, silence only broken by a car driving past outside. Peter thinks he's never been in a place that's smelled of such deep-driven malaise and he hates that Stiles' scent -- butterscotch, toffee, caramel, something sweet he's never been able to pin down precisely -- is drowned out here by the depression of the small town they're in, quiet and miserable people living quiet and miserable lives. 

"Fair enough," Stiles finally replies. "But leave the door open, would you? I like listening to the rain." 

Peter smiles. Perhaps there's something still left of Stiles in the hollowed-out shell he's become. "You always did," he says, and makes his way inside to sit down on the bed next to Stiles. 

Stiles leans against him, lets out a sigh as he gives his weight to Peter to hold up. He smells so tired, exhaustion riding his bones, clinging to his shoulders like some sort of haint that dug in deep and won't ever let go. "How did you find me?" he finally asks. 

"I lost track when you doubled back in Boston," Peter says. "Clever move, by the way. It took seven weeks to pick up your trail after that, and I was only able to because I had feelers out. When I heard about a skinny human with beta-gold eyes leaving Nuevo Michoacán and heading north, I knew it was you." 

"Bella," Stiles says. His face, against Peter's shoulder, moves in what Peter thinks is a smile. "Good kid." 

Peter makes a noise of agreement. "Heard you nearly died healing her up," he says. "Actually, I've heard that the number of times you should've died over the last three years borders on absurd. Is there something you'd like to confess to or is this just an expression of some Freudian death drive?" 

Stiles laughs, just once, a bitter sound that makes Peter's wolf want to howl. "I guess I thought I'd go out doing something good for once, save you the trouble of getting your claws dirty." 

"I --." Peter takes a deep breath, resists the urge to sit up and get in front of Stiles and shake Stiles, like that might help knock loose whatever explanation Stiles has for what he's just said. "I'm not here to kill you, Stiles." 

"You'd really drag me all the way back to Beacon Hills to do it?" Stiles asks. "You think I'd just _let_ you? No. I knew you were getting close. I could feel it. I want you to do it here." 

Peter does move, at that. He elbows Stiles upright then gets up, drops to one knee in front of Stiles, takes Stiles' hands in his. "Stiles, I'm not going to kill you. No one's going to kill you. For one, do you know how many people would come after me for that? You've made allies up and down the entire continent -- hell, after Baton Rouge, Araya Calavera put out word that none of the hunters in the country are to touch you at risk of starting blood-feud with her family. You're a _hero_ , Stiles, and --" 

"Hero," Stiles spits. He rips his hands from Peter's hold, vaults over to the other side of the bed, stands there with his hands curled into fists and his eyes blazing. Even here, in this dump, he looks magnificent, eyes glowing and sparks crackling around his fingers. "I'm not a hero, Peter, I'm a murderer. And I deserve to die for it. I've come to terms with it, okay? I thought -- when I left, I thought maybe I could make up for what I did, balance out the scales a little, but I've learned. I know, now. There's no balancing out what I did." 

"He wouldn't want this," Peter says, rising up slow, hands held up so as not to threaten an outburst of magic that he's never seen but that he's heard untold numbers of stories about. The stories don't agree on much but they all acknowledge the lethality of Stiles' magic -- and the achingly-soft tenderness of it. "He wouldn't want you to call yourself that." 

Stiles scoffs. One of the streetlights outside sparks and hisses as it pops and goes black. "Well, we'll never be able to ask him, will we. Since I _killed him_." 

Peter swallows. He hadn't realised how bad it was. He's talked to so many people, shifters and magicals and hunters, has chased Stiles back and forth and up and down this continent for the last three years, has even come close to catching up with him once or twice, but he never realised that Stiles had been unravelling in a self-destructive dance with suicide the entire time. 

That's why -- oh god. That's why Stiles finally let Peter catch him. That's the only reason Peter ever caught up to Stiles here, in middle-of-nowhere Florida, the air too humid to bear, the sky black with rain. 

"Scott would understand," Peter says. 

Stiles sneers at him, snaps, "Scott's fucking _dead_ , Peter, and I killed him. I was the one who shoved that knife in his heart. So don't tell me he'd _understand_ when it was his own brother that murdered him in cold blood." 

The heartbreak in Stiles' scent is twined so deeply with self-hate that Peter honestly doesn't know how Stiles is standing. 

"You were the only one who could," Peter says. 

"Only because he wasn't my bonded alpha," Stiles says, tone so cold that frost starts to form on the window, that the rain trickling down outside turns to ice pellets, chiming as they bounce against the cement. "And how do you think knowing _that_ little tidbit made him feel." 

Peter shrugs one shoulder, says, "Relieved. Someone had to do it and none of the rest of us could fight against his alpha order. He would've hated that it had to be you but he would have been so _proud_ that --" 

"Shut up," Stiles snarls. "Just shut the fuck up and do what you came here to do, okay? I want it. I'm ready. It's nothing more than I deserve, so kill me and go back to your alpha and tell whoever it is that the job's done." 

"There's no alpha in Beacon Hills," Peter says. 

That seems like it might trip Stiles up for a moment; he stares, the light around his hands flickering out of existence, cold fleeing and humidity flowing back in so quickly that Peter's sinuses throb with the pressure change. "You're not the alpha," Stiles says. "You wouldn't have been able to leave if you were. But if you're not running me to ground for -- you're doing this for _Scott_? You never liked him." 

Peter sighs, resettles his weight. The shift sends Stiles back on high alert and he shakes out his hands, shaping the fingers of his right hand into the beginning formation of some kind of cantrip. Peter wants so much to ask how Stiles picked up all the magic he's been reported using, wants to poke and prod and find out when Stiles had time to study on his hare-brained race away from Peter and the chaos in Beacon Hills. He doesn't, though, not now. They'll be time enough later for that.

"I'm not doing this for Scott," Peter says. "I'm doing it for the rest of us. I'm _trying_ to bring our alpha home." 

Stiles opens his mouth, closes it again as his fingers fall out of position, as he stares at Peter. "What." 

Peter sighs, says, "You're our alpha, Stiles. The only reason you could feel me tracking you is because we have a pack bond. You inherited _all_ of the bonds from Scott when he died. You've just been ignoring them." 

Stiles stumbles backwards, sits on the edge of the second bed before, it looks, his knees give out on him. "I'm human," he says, tone and scent and expression all blank and empty. "There's no way. There's -- it's not possible. No. You've been -- you're here to kill me, that's why you've been tracking me, to kill me or take me to Beacon Hills to face the pack's justice." 

"Scott was possessed," Peter says. "The nogitsune was clever enough to use the pack bonds and alpha voice against us but it never counted on _you_ , and you did the only thing you could. There was no other way to get rid of the nogitsune. We all know that. We all accept it. Me, Derek, Kira, Allison, Lydia, Isaac -- even your father and Alan and Christopher and Melissa, we all know what it cost you to do what you did. We know you did it for us just as much as you did it for Scott. We want our alpha to come _home_ , Stiles." 

"Alpha sparks can't go to humans," Stiles says, staring at Peter. "Sparks from true alphas don't get inherited at all." 

Peter gives Stiles a hesitant smile, points out, "Unless there's someone worthy." 

Stiles looks down at his hands, says, "I wasn't even in his pack." 

"I don't think it matters," Peter says. "Laws in this universe seem to be more fluid than I ever thought. Just -- you said you felt me. Reach out; try finding someone else. _Try_ , please." 

Stiles shakes his head. Peter's gearing up to argue but Stiles says, "I don't have to try. I -- I felt them even up in Rivière-Saint-Paul. I thought it was -- I don't know what I thought it was," he admits, with one of those tired, bitter laughs that Peter's come to loathe in the last ten minutes. "Strings of fate, maybe, or some spell Alan put on me to make it easier to track me down." He looks up at Peter, expression on his face, in his eyes, so young and broken, and asks, "The pack doesn't want me dead?" 

Peter takes the chance and moves -- slowly -- around the bed, sitting down opposite Stiles. "We don't want you dead, Stiles. We want you to stop running and come home." 

"But _Scott_ ," Stiles says, weakly. 

He doesn't resist when Peter leans forward and reaches out, taking Stiles' hands in his again. Stiles looks down at where their fingers are laced together and listens, finally _listens_ , as Peter tells him, "He would be so proud of you, Stiles. He'd be so thankful that you sacrificed yourself to save him from being forced to carry out the nogitsune's plans and he'd be so relieved that you saved the pack. Come home. Let Allison tell you that. Let Melissa tell you that. We'll tell you every hour, if that's what you need to hear." 

Stiles exhales hard, blinks back tears. Peter wants to lick them off of Stiles' face, gather up the pack around Stiles and curl in close, comfort him with pack, with loyalty and adoration and the sheer exhilaration of knowing that this man, this beautiful, broken man, is theirs, that he'd cut out his own heart for them even if they'd never expect it from him, never ask it of him. 

"I killed him," Stiles says, and Peter can see Stiles' shoulders start to move faster, hears the rhythm of his heart and lungs speed up, just slightly faster at first and then suddenly into a roaring furor. Peter scrambles to get close to Stiles, to pull Stiles into his lap, wrap his arms around Stiles, to press Stiles' face to Peter's throat. "Killed him, I killed him, I killed him," Stiles says, gasps, and Peter starts to rock Stiles back and forth. He wonders if this is the first time Stiles has actually mourned Scott, rather than the necessity of taking the actions he did, and he holds Stiles tighter, rubs his cheek on Stiles' hair, murmuring nonsense words, noises, trying to comfort a man who was forced to grow up far too much, far too fast. 

Stiles grips Peter's shirt tight in his fists, words devolving into wordless, animal cries of heart-deep pain. All Peter can do is hold on, hold tight, and promise never to let go -- so that's what he does.


End file.
